Sure, government funding of aged care is pathetic measured against what is needed and what is provided. That gap is leading to bad outcomes for some residents and even staff as the media so often remind us.

But how much funding is enough?

This is both a pragmatic and a philosophical question encompassing age old dilemmas:

• Should taxpayers fund other taxpayers for their aged care?
• To what extent should they?
• Does paying tax all your working life bring with it later life entitlements such as funded aged care?
• How much more should the rich pay compared to the poor for aged care?
• Should the family home be fully taken into account in how much we pay for aged care?
• Do we need the family to take on more responsibility?
• How can aged care operators make a reasonable profit as they need to in order to keep operating?

I have my own views on each of these questions but they are really fundamental to the entire imbroglio of our aged care despair.

Our advocates, policy makers and politicians need to answer these questions before we can even reach any point of community harmony, let alone uniformity, on the answers.